In an article on the Times Online site, Tom Bawden, looks at why British companies are failing to attract their fair share of invenstment.

Research shows that Britain is attracting only 2.5% of the global investment in green technology. The reasons behind this include an over reliance on government-backed initial investment and  management lacking commercial expertise.

“Too many clean-tech companies are focused on the technology without considering whether it is something that can actually make money. It is a complaint of many venture capitalists and [fund investors] that there is an insufficient focus on commerciality,” says Edmund Truell a former chief executive of Duke Street Capital. “First and foremost a new product has to be economically viable. If it happens to be green as well, that’s a bonus.”

Tom Murley, chairman of the British Venture Capital Association’s Energy, Environment and Technology Group, who runs HG Capital’s €300m renewable-energy fund, says “In an industry that has been supported by government handouts, there tend to be lots of big ideas that are not typically that commercial.

“In renewables we have a lot of people who see opportunities, have great designs and think it’s all going to work out in the end. But as we learnt in the dotcom era, that isn’t always the case.

“The key problem is lack of management talent. We have some brilliant guys with some great ideas but we just don’t have the first-class management teams in this sector.”

For the full article got to: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7107234.ece